As I mentioned, this newsletter can hardly function as a list of all online applications. CrunchBase and SimpleSpark are good resources to explore all the possibilities. For the rest of this newsletter, I'll review the applications we actually use and mention one or two other alternative providers of similar applications.
Email
A year ago I made the switch from Outlook to Gmail. I took me about a week to get used to the significant difference in Gmail's approach to email, but once I adapted I saw how much better Gmail is over Outlook. For one thing, I like accessing my main email from any computer or even from my Treo. I also love the speed at which Gmail searches through all my email history. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, this is Google after all. I used to have to file my email into dozens of folders to keep them organized. Even then, it was a pain to find old email. Now, all I have to do is remember a name or even a single word from a past email and I can get to it almost instantly. Another great feature of Gmail is its conversation threading. When someone responds to an email I sent, it strings together all the related emails as a conversation. Emails that have had multiple responses and replies are readily available whenever a new reply is added. This helps keep my inbox under control.
Yahoo! has an improved web based email in the works. I haven't reviewed it, but I'm sure it'll be better than the old-fashioned, computer-anchored Outlook approach.
As I proceed you may get tired of my total Google orientation. This is because I generally trust Google. And since I've already adopted a couple key Google tools like Gmail and Google Reader it just makes sense for me too stick with Google's stuff. That being said, Yahoo! is equally trustworthy. If I were not already Google-oriented, I would consider Yahoo's services a viable option for web-based apps.
Even though I'm a Google guy, there's one company that I have had my eye on for a while: Zoho. Zoho's suite of web-based applications have been pushing the envelope for some time now. They have more products than Google, or anyone else that I know of. Their offerings tend to be the most robust and full featured available. In fact, Zoho has already implemented Google Gears for their word processing application--Zoho Writer--while Google has not yet enabled it for Docs & Speadsheets.
Zoho is a private company based in India that seems to be pouring more concerted R&D effort at web applications than anyone else--and most of there products are free. The main reason I have not jumped on the Zoho bandwagon is fear that as an independent company, without an obvious revenue model, they might prove unstable. I have not felt confident enough to move beyond trying out their tools to depending on them. However, they've hung in there for a while now and I've gotten to know a little bit more about the company. I continue to like what I see. Suffice it to say that for any web-based application, Zoho likely offers one that functions better than its competitors.
Zimbra is another web application developer that follows a more traditional software licensing model, offering enterprise-level services for email and calendar systems.
For other CRM solutions try Salesboom.com
Check out Commence CRM which is 100% web-based and runs on Windows/Mac/Linux.
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